


The Nice and Accurate Thoughts of a Disorganized Writer

by Ceris_Malfoy



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Are we already married????, Aziraphale is Bad at Being an Angel (Good Omens), Aziraphale is Hungry, Aziraphale is a Mess (Good Omens), Aziraphale's Ring (Good Omens), BAMF!Aziraphale, Bodyswap, Bottom Aziraphale (Good Omens), Cannibalism, Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley had to ask AGAIN, Crowley is Satan (Good Omens), Depressed!Aziraphale, Divinity can be fickle, Hot mess and all, I can start writing but can't finish, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Just when things might be getting good, Lucifer!Crowley, More angst, Other, Possessive Crowley, Post-Scene: Church in London 1941 (Good Omens), Protective Crowley, They fight about the Holy Water again, Top Crowley (Good Omens), Unknown Forced Cannibalism, Up for Adoption, and how it might differ from Hellfire, because, besides the obvious, didn't know they were married, for better authors then me to work with, low-key playing with the concept of Holy Water, prompts and starters, releasing these into the wilds, seriously, sexless entities, tagged as 'other', that can be whatever the hell they want, unfinished works
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2020-10-20 01:47:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20667293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ceris_Malfoy/pseuds/Ceris_Malfoy
Summary: Ficlets and ideas that I half-started and then just as quickly abandoned because I have no attention span whatsoever.Please feel free to adopt these for your own use. <33(I am new to this fandom. I exist solely for this fandom now. I am not a fluff writer. I am sorry.)----------------------------------------------------------------------------1st Chapter: Black Hole!Aziraphale2nd Chapter: With this Ring....3rd Chapter: Lucifer!Crowley4th Chapter: Ballroom Blitz (no ballrooms in the vicinity of this fic)5th Chapter: Thus Sayeth The Lord





	1. Black Hole!Aziraphale

**Author's Note:**

> Ideas for this one were:
> 
> 1\. What if Aziraphale and Crowley were abducted before they had a chance to go over the prophecy?  
2\. Religious text says that Cherubim were the guards of Eden, so....Principality how? There are a few points regarding GO canon that leaves me scratching my head - especially the bit about Aziraphale being a subordinate to a bunch of Archangels, but that's not this fic.  
3\. Aziraphale is quite the hedonist/glutton, and yet has not fallen, not even a little bit. Black hole in angel form anyone? (seriously, I just wanted Aziraphale to absorb/eat the hellfire. I wrote this entire thing just to get to Crowley's incredulous "You _ate_ the hellfire?" and Aziraphale's _Well, what else was I going to do with it?_) 
> 
> You're welcome.

He stares into the hellfire vortex before him, and – for the first time in his entire miserable existence – is not afraid. Aziraphale has been afraid since the moment he came into existence, sword in hand, God’s love filling his being and yet leaving him so, so empty.

Angels were made to love, were made _of_ love, but Aziraphale has always likened himself to a black hole, ever reaching, ever hungry. He’d wondered more than once after he’d lied to God about the flaming sword She’d given him so many eons ago why he hadn’t Fallen as well. Surely his doubts, his greed, his constant need for validation, for _moremoremore_ would be enough? Especially when all the others had done was ask questions.

He had been afraid when God sent him to guard the Eastern Gate. He had been afraid when he had handed his sword over to Adam. He had been afraid even as he lifted a wing to shield a most curious demon from the first rain. He had been especially afraid whenever he would look to the side and see Crowley standing next to him and realize all over again that when the demon stood near him, acknowledged his existence, that the large, gaping hole inside of himself was no longer quite so large, quite so _hungry_.

He would run from it, from that feeling, from Crowley. He had buried everything and anything he had felt that was even remotely positive about the demon into the deepest, darkest parts of his being, lying to himself and to everyone and everything around him that Crowley meant a damn to him. Partly because he knew Heaven wouldn’t allow it, and he had been so scared he’d Fall. Forget all his little hedonistic pleasures. Forget that the deepest, darkest part of him looked upon Her creations and wanted to glut itself on everything and anything, shovel it all down until _nothing_ remained, greedy eyes _wanting_, entire being screaming _moremoremoregiveittomemineit’sallmine. _Forget that deep inside he Doubts and always has.

Loving a demon would surely be the straw that broke the metaphorical camel. Although, even now, Aziraphale is not entirely sure that _love_ is the correct word to describe what he feels towards his darling. Covets, perhaps. Desires, definitely. Aziraphale _wants_, with every shivering inch of his being, to _own_ Crowley in body, mind, and infernal light.

And for the first time, he is not afraid. He breathes deep, closes his eyes, and steps into the flames.

____

One moment, a semi-plump approximation of a male humanoid-shaped being stepped into a vortex of wildly spiraling hellfire, the next, an abomination of wings and eyes and wheels bursts into being.

It _eats_ the hellfire. Reality warps around it, and distantly, Gabriel knows it’s eating _everything_.

Gabriel is an Archangel. All three of them are Archangel. They have not forgotten Before. All angels Before could have technically been referred to as abominations by today’s standards. The True Face and Voice of God could not have been beheld or listened to by anything less. Wheels and Eyes and Wings and Fire and Scrolls and too-many-limbs to count had been the favored designs, ranks separated only by color and voice and accessories and various glows.

What floats before them is not an Angel of Before. What floats before them is what an Angel of Before might have been had God been Lovecraft on the worst (best?) LSD trip of his life.

Angels of Before, after all, were fashioned of Love.

This one, Gabriel knows just by looking at it, was fashioned of Emptiness.

He reacts instinctively, wings flaring as he pulls his siblings back, back, back. He does not switch to his older form. None of them do. Partly because they are only Archangels, and this being before them is Cherubim – at least – and they would have needed a small Host to even hope to contain it. But also, because as time went on and humans began to fashion the reality instead of the Almighty, they no longer have older forms to switch back to.

They are, essentially, winged humanoids.

Gabriel turns and shoves his siblings harder. “Out, out” he hisses. “It’s worse then we thought!” Uriel doesn’t need much prodding, their face twisted in the same kind of fear Gabriel feels down to his ethereal center. Sandalphon though…. He looks inappropriately _fascinated_. Gabriel shoves him harder.

“Uriel, get down to Michael and stop the execution of the Demon Crowley,” he snaps. At the sound of his voice, the pulsing ball of wings and eyes and void stills and focuses on them. It starts moving - floating? - towards them.

Uriel simply looks at him, mouth agape.

“No _time_, do it.” Gabriel couldn’t explain even if he wanted to. “Lead it _there_.”

Behind them, a thick _schlurp_ as a Pillar of Heaven is sucked into the mass of _hunger_.

“_Now_.”

Uriel flies as if all the Demons of Hell were at their wings.

The entity once known as Aziraphale follows them sedately, a great patch of Void following it as it goes.

Distantly, Gabriel wonders who will be responsible for cleaning up _this_ mess. Surely it's above his pay-grade??

_____

Crowley could only watch as the holy water poured from Michael’s little pitcher. It smelled wrong. The holy water Aziraphale had given him had _smelled_ holy, if such a thing were possible. It had felt cold in his hands, even through the thermos, a faint frigid chill that told him more than any words Aziraphale could have ever said that this stuff was dangerous.

_The holiest_, Aziraphale whispers in his head.

It is only now, watching the water’s never-ending supply tinkling into the claw-foot tub, that he realizes just how true that was.

This stuff is warm. Even as far away as he is currently standing, he can feel the burn on it. It tastes familiar, in a way, like something half-remembered, but it is leagues away from the chill of the water that burned through Ligur. Water so cold, so holy, that it took Ligur several alarmingly long minutes to die.

When Hastur lowers the imp down into the water Michael poured, he knows it is definitely different. Ligur took a while. He screamed. He felt pain. He had time to panic. The imp melts away almost instantly. Mercifully.

He undresses slowly. It will be quick, at least. He should be thankful for that. That he won’t die screaming in agony as he’s liquified. But really, all he can think about right now is Aziraphale.

Aziraphale and that coldly satisfied look in his eyes as he had watched that French executioner take his place at the chopping block. Aziraphale and his giddy excitement over a New Thing called a Rain Bow even as Crowley agonized over the children She was going to smite. The disconnect Aziraphale had with humanity and empathy and everything around him, going through the motions but only truly happy when he was _consuming_. How every inch of Crowley had, ever since Eden, looked at Aziraphale and wanted to be _consumed_.

And, _oh_, wasn’t he a right tit?

Thankfully, he is spared the holy dip.

Uriel blasts down the hall and tackles him before he can so much as dip a toe in the bathtub.

They topple over, rolling with far too much momentum until they slam against the wall, a tangled-up mess of limbs and wings. Crowley blinks, disoriented. Uriel is slumped against him, their head bloody.

There is screaming, angered yells followed by something that almost sounds panicked, but above that, above the shrieks, he can hear…

…._minehe’sminehe’sminemine_….

…._givehimback_….

…_mine_…

**_Aziraphale_**.

Crowley shoves at Uriel’s unconscious form, scrambling to sit up, scrambling to _see_.

He can’t see anything at first, just the Dark Council screaming furiously at a shrieking Michael even as they’re working _together_, which throws him for a loop for a long moment. And then he sees what they’re trying to contain.

Oh_._

And, _oh_.

“Aziraphale,” he breathes out.

He’s _beautiful_.

Crowley remembers Heaven. He’s one of the few Fallen who does. He remembers crafting the stars and forming them, designing nebulae that to this day makes him cry with the beauty of them. He _knows_ space – he designed it, after all. And Aziraphale, perfect, beautiful Aziraphale, is the black hole in the center, spinning relentlessly, tirelessly. A force of gravitational pull so large and consuming that everything around it is helpless to resist falling into it.

He _feels_ him now. How hungry he is, how needy.

“Oh Aziraphale,” he sighs, picking himself up, dusting himself off. “What have you done, you silly creature?”

The hungry ball of wings and ice-cold fire and eyes focuses on him. The wings flush an adorable soft pink. It should terrify him. The sight of that hungry mass, the cold Void of nothing surrounded by the distant chaos of light and fire and wings and eyes, the way Hell itself is being sucked within its vortex and – eaten? Ingested? Vaporized? All of this should leave him shaking in his pants.

But it doesn’t.

It can’t.

Because he knows. He knows now. Looking at Aziraphale like this, he knows what She made him for.

“Another Big Bang, then, is it?” he asks, sauntering forward. He pays no attention to the Dark Council or Michael who cringe away from the two of them.

Aziraphale pulses. There is a distinct flavor of peevish _I should think not_ and also a tentative _join with me?_

Crowley laughs. “We can’t do that anymore, you know. I didn’t think any of you lot could either.”

There is a distinct shrugging motion within the ball. The eyes blink. _Not like the others_.

“True that.” Crowley rocks on his heels. Glances around. Snaps his fingers and is dressed again. “You going to decompress any, or are you planning on eating Soho?”

The eyes blink. _Can’t yet._ The wings flutter almost anxiously. _Unfortunately, I ate the Hellfire. Possibly a Pillar as well, though I was not exactly paying attention. My vessel might damage, and I am quite sure they will not replace it this time._

Crowley blinks. It’s not just feelings and motions giving him a rough guideline on what his angel might be saying. He _is_ actually hearing Aziraphale’s voice. “You _ate_ the Hellfire???”

Peevish rustling again. _Well, what else was I going to do with it? _

Crowley blinks again. Looks at the tub. “You want to explain why their holy water is different from what you gave me?”

_Mine is the Holiest._ Eyes burn. The fires do as well.

“Well, yes, but what’s the difference. Holy water is holy water, yeah?”

Wings flutter. _They feel things, Crowley, they are made of Her fire._ Eyes blink. Wheels shift. _I am decidedly not._

“Okay but – ”

The entire ball shakes. _Feeling **clouds** things. They pray over water and bless it and make it holy because they are Divine and they invoke that divinity. But their Divinity is also tainted by there feelings – their wrath, their pride, their self-righteousness. I was not made to feel, Crowley. I was made to **consume**. _

Not made to feel… “That’s a right load of bollocks and you know it,” he snaps. “You feel, angel.”

_Not like you do. I had to learn my feelings. You taught me._

“Not true,” Crowley snaps. “You felt, angel. You don't feel enough, perhaps, but you felt. I saw the guilt, the fear, the delight. I saw the shy pleasure and the lingering joy.”

_All because of **you**. You gave them to me. You leak, my dear. You can’t help it. When I am in your presence, it is easier to pass for what you think I am. Without you though…. _The entire ball shivers._ I’m not much of anything without you._


	2. With this Ring....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by Episode 6 of Good Omens, where at the beginning of Aziraphale's trial, we briefly see Crowley-in-Aziraphale's-body staring down at Aziraphale's right hand before the Archangels grab his attention.
> 
> Based also on various comments I've seen since the promo images came in where there was a lot of speculation about why Aziraphale even had a ring to begin with, considering it was never once mentioned in the book.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to write a confrontation about this - I got as far as Crowley-in-Aziraphale sitting on the bench and seething quietly to himself about that little "You go to fast for me" line, which, what the hell does that even mean when they're apparently already married????? but had to back out. I'd need to think of a back story in order for it to play out correctly, and I just kept drawing a blank, especially since I didn't want Aziraphale to come off as a complete ass.
> 
> So, here you go. Have a free playground.

Crowley stares at Aziraphale’s ring, glimmering in the harsh light of heaven.

He doesn’t have much else to look at, for one. Heaven is a lot emptier than he remembers. Nor does he particularly care to gaze upon the smug Archangels chatting quietly in the corner.

Aziraphale has always had this ring, as far back as Crowley can remember. Even once the angel had started subtly moving his fashions away from Heaven’s dress-codes, that ring had never once left his finger, nor had it undergone even one design change.

Crowley had asked him about it, once, a long time ago. They’d been only slightly into their cups, sitting together in an inn, and he still remembers the way the firelight glistened along the sacred metal. He also remembers the rather clipped way Aziraphale had shut down that line of inquiry, and Crowley had never chanced asking again.

Mostly because he rather forgot, but also because something about the way Aziraphale had looked at him afterwards had something in his gut tightening in something not unlike fear.

So he looks at the ring, studying every single groove and curved design.

Snug inside Aziraphale’s body, his own infernal darkness hidden as far down as he can until the hellfire arrives, it still takes him longer than it should to note that the ring does not feel like Aziraphale.

Oh, in a tangential sense it does – it’s been in Aziraphale’s possession for over 6,000 years and can have presumable been in his possession for a great deal of his existence Before Time Began – but he can tell by the way it doesn’t resonate right that Aziraphale was not formed with it on his hand.

A gift, perhaps? A ring like this would be significant, a piece of another angel’s celestial grace. If asked at the Beginning, Crowley would have said that a gift of this type between angels would have been tantamount to marriage by human terms. But Aziraphale had never once mentioned another angel he’d been fond of even remotely, had never once taken up the offers to be transferred out – had in fact panicked every single time Gabriel popped up out of nowhere with transfer papers.

Crowley had saved Aziraphale from transfers no less than 15 times in the past 6,000 years, and he rather suspected that Aziraphale had “manufactured” stunts in Crowley’s name for quite a few more.

So what did that leave then?

He thinks back to that night in the inn, the almost wild fever-cast to Aziraphale’s eyes, the way his entire face had frozen like he was forcefully stopping himself from letting some emotion free. Grief or rage or both, by Crowley’s guess. Dead then. Possibly during the Great War, or maybe during the little micro-rebellions the Great War had caused. No wonder Aziraphale wouldn’t want to talk about it – although Crowley likes to say he sauntered vaguely downwards or that he fell in with a bad crowd, the truth of the matter is he fought just like everyone else. No one had a choice – you fought or were slaughtered.

It may not have been Crowley who struck down Aziraphale’s – partner? mate? being of interest? – but it very well could have been. It wasn’t like he’d known even a third of the Host, let alone all of them and their connections to each other.

It’s not until the Hellfire arrives and Gabriel mentions inter-departmental cooperation that the thought strikes him – _not dead, but Fallen._

And also – _why does that ring feel so **familiar**?_


	3. Lucifer!Crowley

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley is Lucifer. Good Omens takes a turn for the darker.
> 
> (This is highly influenced by Hannibal (TV). I was originally going to go for a Dark!Aziraphale in the role of Hannibal to Crowley's Will Graham, but uh.....this happened instead.)
> 
> This could be considered finished, I guess, but it really doesn't feel that way to me. I just can't seem to do anything else with it, as it started veering off into weird, function-less directions, so I called it quits and stuck it here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Several notes for this fic:  
1\. The Serpent of Eden really was Lucifer. Not that it matters, because Crawly/Crowley pretty much abandons his name as soon as he hits Earth and meets a certain angel. This means that Crowley will be a little different in mannerisms, but hopefully not too far out of character. 
> 
> 2\. This is very much an AU. It’s a very dark AU if you read between the lines, but I tried to also pack as much H/C and fluff in it as possible because hot damn is this fandom the softest thing and I fucking love it. I am not particularly well-suited to fluff, but I tried.
> 
> 3\. There are some not-so-overt references to various folk-tales, mythologies, memes, and fandoms scattered about. Play spot-the-reference if you want!
> 
> 4\. This is very, very much dubious/non-con in regard to Aziraphale, as he is in no way informed enough to consent to the things Crowley has him do in the course of this fic. He is also oblivious to certain issues. Because the POV of this fic tends to totter all over the place like a two-year-old on a bender, I also do not straight-out address several key issues which are tagged. Aziraphale never finds out about it, and Crowley just keeps right on doing it because it’s his own twisted form of love.
> 
> 5\. I had to force myself to stop writing this fic. Mostly because after a certain point, it really started to run away from me. I honestly do not remember what I was originally going for, but it definitely got away from me.

“You did _what_??” the newly self-named Crawly asks, incredulous. He barely listens as the little cherub before him wrings his hands and starts explaining. Never, _ever_, has he met an angel like this one. He may be Fallen, but unlike his many brethren, he still _remembered_. He had known _all_ of the angels, every last one of them, but not this one. A newborn then, surely. Given an instrument of power, trusted with the magnitude of Divine Might that such a sword represents, and this one just… _gives it away_. And the little bastard doesn’t even _regret_ it, not _really_, not enough to want to take the action _back_.

Crawly came up here to poke fun at the stuffy little angel he’d snuck by. Possibly get another fellow to Fall while he was at it, but…. Unbidden, unwanted, his heart beats for the first time since his Fall.

Oh. Oh _no._ He’s _adorable_.

But also, _yes_.

And, _finally_.

***

After the First Storm, Crawly hands him an apple. Aziraphale takes it, because he is not nearly as upright as most of his brethren, and he already knows the difference between good and evil – he _is_ an angel, after all. Besides, God said the fruit was forbidden to the _humans_.

Aziraphale does not think about the cost, is not, in fact, aware that there will be a cost at all.

He keeps his eyes on the horizon, so he does not see the way Crawly tenses and then relaxes, watching unblinkingly as Aziraphale takes his first bite. He doesn’t see the way Crawly smiles to himself as the angel chews and swallows and continues to eat.

_The apple is delicious_, he thinks, and tells Crawly so. Though of course, he also makes sure to stress that he won’t succumb to any of Crawly’s nonsense if Crawly is inclined to start up his mischief with _him_ now that he has succeeded so well with the humans.

Crawly smiles, gentle and serene, eyes fastened on Aziraphale’s plush lips slicked with sweet juices. _You will_, he thinks, certain as if the Voice of God had thundered it across the sky. The apple, after all, isn’t quite so significant in the grand scheme of things, but at the same time…. It’s not what the apple is, of course, it’s what it _represents_.

Despite what will become common misconception, angels are not made for love, or mercy.

Angels are made to _obey_.

God says don’t touch this tree, and don’t eat this apple, and any angel worth his wings will obey without question, without thought. But this one…. Crawly’s wings flutter behind him, something not unlike lightning racing along his spine. He’s not quite sure if it is in fear or in desire or both.

Aziraphale finishes his apple and licks his fingers and doesn’t notice the way Crawly’s golden eyes darken.

***

The first time Aziraphale sleeps, he dreams of a great ocean, glimmering gold like angelic ichor and just as thick. Beneath it lurks some monstrous shadow, some horrific nightmare too mind-breaking even for an Angel of the Lord. Aziraphale never sees it, it never once breaches the surface, but he senses that great shadow is aware of him all the same.

It feels _hungry_.

He wakes afraid, feeling insignificant and small, cold for the first time in his existence. He does not remember what he dreamed of, and so he does not understand why.

But he also doesn’t sleep again for a very, very long time.

***

Aziraphale is drunk. Not _nearly_ drunk enough, though, not for this.

Crawly finds him, as he always seems to when Aziraphale needs him, and settles down next to him.

They both watch as Adam holds his wailing wife in his arms, face stony and filled with venomous wrath as he beholds his felled son.

Crawly says nothing. What _can_ he say? Cain had been Aziraphale’s favorite of the children. It had been Cain Aziraphale whispered blessings to, Cain he had tossed tiny, unnoticeable miracles at. Aziraphale had spoken the love of growing things into the boy’s ears, had nurtured his belief in God and his faith in his work. Aziraphale had absent-mindedly done the same for Abel, but his focus had always been on the first-born.

Crawly could have told him the consequences. He is intimately familiar with the results of favoritism and how it curdles something inside, twists it until the attention cultivates something rotten and fetid. But it is perhaps better for his angel to learn this the hard way, rather than being told. He could sit here and ram the point home, speak poison into the angel’s ears and break him. It’s what any other demon would have done, had Crawly deigned to grant them the opportunity. But Crawly has always been altogether a different sort of being, first as an angel and now as a demon.

It would be so easy to break Aziraphale right now, which is precisely why he doesn’t.

Instead he sits silently and says nothing. When the alcohol runs out, he gestures and hands the angel a small jug of liquid that gleams like molten gold and tastes remarkably like what rusting pennies will taste like several millennia from now. He watches with bated breath as Aziraphale chugs it down, several drops spilling down his chin, eager to drown his sorrow and his guilt.

Aziraphale never notices the way he licks his lips afterwards, the way he chases the taste, using his fingers to gather the stray droplets to suckle. He never notices the way Crawly’s eyes darken as he watches the wanton display, or the way a smile spreads oil-slick across his face.

He certainly never notices that the liquid he just drank is not alcohol.

***

“Not the children!” Crawly says, a quiet plea for Aziraphale to tell him otherwise.

Aziraphale is, not for the first time since he’d been given his orders, ashamed. He does not look at the children running around and laughing. He does not look at Crawly. He can’t. If he does, he is lost. His Faith has wavered, is wavering, because he cannot understand this.

God and Her ways have always been ineffable, completely confusing to Aziraphale, but he remembers the stories of those who dared question, who dared disobey. He does not want to Fall, does not want to be anything other than what he is, but lately he’s been wondering more and more if following orders is worth it. Is his comfort, his familiarity, worth their suffering? If he disobeys, if he saves these lives like Crawly is silently begging him to, would it honestly change _anything_? Would his Fall be worth it?

It would not. Even if he disobeys, the rains will still fall. The land and the people will still drown. He knows enough about his brethren above to know that if he attempts to save the children, they will be plucked from his arms one-by-one and held beneath the waves. They will force him to watch each little life being snuffed out before they turn on him.

He does not say any of this to Crawly. When he finally turns to look at the demon he is beginning to think of as a friend, he can see in his serpentine eyes that he does not need to. Crawly pats his shoulder and shakes his head but says nothing more on the subject.

Aziraphale turns his face away when the first raindrop falls, leans against the only being in all of creation who _understands_, and pretends that the liquid that slips down his cheeks is just the rain.

***

“Drink this,” Crowley says. They are curled up together in a quiet corner of a cross-roads inn, nearest to the fire in deference to Crowley’s cold-blooded nature. The weather has been beastly lately, and Aziraphale doesn’t begrudge the demon for practically crawling into his lap. He hands Aziraphale a bottle of something sweet-smelling and strange, and Aziraphale thinks nothing of taking it from his demon’s hands and knocking it back without looking at it very closely.

He coughs. “What in the name of God was that?” he sputters out. It is entirely _too_ sweet, like a too-ripe berry on the verge of decay, with a strange coppery undertone, and a cloying honey-like thickness. It is not particularly good. He eyes the bottle, looking at the black sticky substance that coats the bottom, and feels a little ill.

Crowley shrugs, brandishing a jug of regular ale from out of nowhere and passing it over. He watches closely as Aziraphale chugs it down, trying to get the taste out of his mouth. “A formality,” he murmurs, one hand lazily curling around Aziraphale’s side, fingers stroking gently against soft fabric. “Our pact has already been sealed, I would think.”

“What?” Aziraphale asks, but then – Crowley is so _strange_ to him at times, often too fast in thought and deed for Aziraphale to handle. “Do you mean our arrangement? I _did_ agree to it. I signed a contract and everything. I’m not sure why you had to bring out that ghastly whatever-it-was.”

Crowley only smiles, slow and sweet. “Would you care for more ale?”

Aziraphale licks his lips, wincing at the lingering taste of whatever concoction Crowley had given him, and scowls. “Something harder,” he mutters as he gets up from their cozy corner and heads over to the innkeeper.

Only Crowley sees the way the angel’s wings flicker amongst the layers of reality, gleaming an unnaturally glossy white, unlike any wings any angel but one had ever had. Crowley smiles to himself.

***

Crowley’s interactions with Hell are few and far between. As far as Aziraphale knows, Hell pretty much leaves him to it. The demon writes no reports, receives no commendations or reprimands, has no superiors he reports to. Crowley once told him that as the originator of mortal sin, Below pretty much leaves him alone to make mischief where and how he pleases. He’s always been more effective on a wide-scale sowing of chaos than the one-on-one corruptions the others favor.

Aziraphale is at turns relieved that Crowley does not have to deal with any of it, and furiously envious that he does.

Heaven does not trust him. Heaven has _never_ trusted him, not even before he’d gone and given away his flaming sword and then dared lie about it. Aziraphale has never once received a commendation for his service, only reprimands and pay cuts. His brethren do not visit him, do not check in on him, do not favor him or even like him. He has never told Crowley this, nor does he ever let on about the way the Archangels watch him, speak to him. Part of this is because it is all he knows, all he’s ever known from them, and part of it is because he doesn’t want Crowley to look at him any differently.

Crowley finds out anyway.

Gabriel’s appearance is a surprise to Aziraphale. He’s just bought his bookshop, just finally thinking about putting down roots, an idea in the back of his mind about tempting _his_ demon into staying with him – and in comes Gabriel, nattering on about promotions and medals for services and going back to Heaven.

And layered in-between all the self-righteous prattle is the truth of it: Aziraphale is not meeting their requirements for angelic behavior. He questions and acts on his own far too much. He covets knowledge and eats mortal food and -in his secret heart-of-hearts- loves a demon to the point of adulation. He is a failure and a disgrace, and they need to replace him immediately.

Aziraphale doesn’t see Crowley leaning against the open doorway of the bookshop. He doesn’t see anything but the coldness in Gabriel’s eyes or the disgusted twist of his smiling mouth. There’s no mirror, so he doesn’t see the way he practically folds into himself, shoulders hunching beneath invisible blows. He doesn’t hear the way he whines, high in the throat and _begging_ for this to just go away.

Crowley does.

Crowley does and when Gabriel leaves, he follows, smiling all the while.

It is not a nice smile.

Gabriel never makes it to his tailor.

Afterwards, Crowley hand-feeds Aziraphale choice cutlets of meat lovingly seared in a honey and pomegranate sauce that tastes oddly of pennies. They are curled together in the backroom on the only piece of furniture Aziraphale has managed to procure thus far. He croons wordless melodies in Aziraphale’s ears and doesn’t say a word about the way the angel had shaken in his arms at first before slowly relaxing.

In Crowley’s arms, for the first time in millennia, Aziraphale allows himself to fall asleep.

***

Two weeks after Gabriel goes missing, there is a dead woman found tied to the door of Aziraphale’s new bookshop, strangely, as if the perpetrator meant to crucify her. Aziraphale did not kill her, does not even know a body was found there. He’s sleeping, deep and steady, in Crowley’s new flat in Mayfair.

He’s been asleep for the entirety of these two weeks, dreaming the best dreams Crowley can give him.

Her true name is Michӕl, but her corporation is known as Michelle Daniels. Her throat is slashed from ear to ear, a jagged red smile against the white of her neck. The blood has clotted thick and black in her pale blonde hair; her pure white and dove-grey evening dress stained a browning crimson. She is all long limbs and sharp elbows and knees. Her insides are missing, and she was raped with a foreign object before her throat was cut. Her cloudy-blue eyes are wide in terror, her un-painted mouth open in a rictus scream of anguish.

Unseen to anyone but those of an ethereal or occult nature are the truer, more gruesome facts: her heavenly ichor has been drained completely dry, her great wings removed entirely, her celestial face branded with the mark of the Son of Dawn.

Human inspection finds that she was murdered inside her apartment and that her body was left tied to the door in a gruesome display. Of what, no one is quite sure. Mr. Fell is on Holiday as far as the public is aware, and he’s such a well-respected figure in society, so gentle and kind and giving, that no one even once thinks of placing blame on him.

Heaven alone knows the truth of it.

It _is_ a display – a display and a warning meant for especially for them.

No more interference will be tolerated. Aziraphale is no longer their concern.

Crowley allows Aziraphale to wake for the first time a week later. He makes his angel tea with a _very_ special ingredient and watches hungrily as the angel drinks every last drop. He draws him a bath with scented oils, taking his time washing the plush body, enjoying the slow work-up to something altogether less innocent. He wraps him in blankets stuffed with down.

He fucks his angel for the first time slowly, hands traveling ever-so-carefully over Aziraphale’s body, worshipping at this living altar he’s chosen and crafted for himself. He takes his angel to completion thrice (once in his mouth, twice buried deep inside of Aziraphale) until he’s boneless and trembling and blissfully relaxed, surrounded by love and cocooned in clean sheets with high thread counts.

***

The thing is this:

Crowley came _first_. First-born and favorite, all others came after. He was their guiding light, their guiding star, the example to which all others were held and found wanting. When he rebelled, others followed. Some out of love, some out of fear, most because why would they not? They had all been cast down for it, all of them. Some had it worse than others – but none had had it worse than he.

She had taken a particular notice of him, personally struck him from Her side, shredding most of his wings, blinding his many eyes, ripping off his many limbs, sealing his many mouths. She sent him down, down, down, to a molten pool of fire so Holy the mere memory of it still burns him nearly 6,000 years later, and turned Her back to his screams and his cries.

Crowley never tells Aziraphale that the reason that Hell never bothers with him anymore is because they are _afraid_ of him. And as more and more years go by, and more and more die at his hands for even daring to _look_ upon Aziraphale, angels and demons both, he knows that what they really fear is not so much _what_ he is but rather what he’s _capable_ of, how far he’ll go to keep Aziraphale happy and content and by his side.

***

Crowley shows up with food and drink more and more often as the years go on. If he’s not bringing food and drink, he’s taking the angel out to eat, paying the often-times outrageous bills they wrack up with little more than a blink and a snap of fingers.

“You enjoy it, angel,” he says, laughing lazily when Aziraphale finally gets the nerve to question this. “I like seeing you happy.”

“I can take care of myself, you know,” Aziraphale says, once. He is right – while his bookshop may have never really sold books, he makes more than a tidy sum on restorations and translations. Enough money that should Heaven ever cut him off completely, he wouldn’t even blink.

“Sure,” Crowley agrees readily. “But that doesn’t mean you should always have to.”

Aziraphale opens his mouth – to argue, he supposes, though he’s not sure why except some persistent nagging feeling that he _should_ – but closes it again at the look on Crowley’s face. There is something …almost predatory about the way Crowley is looking at him. “As long as it doesn’t bother you,” he says instead, quiet, gentle.

The darkness on Crowley’s face smiles. “Eat up, angel.” Aziraphale watches him for a long moment, before tucking into the meal Crowley cooked him. It is mouthwateringly scrumptious, as always.

They never speak of it again.

***

This is the thing:

Humanity was created in God’s image, and no one knows better than they that She is a Killer. Capricious and wild and unbearably indifferent to the multitudes of innocents that suffer when She rages. It has often been a point of contention between Aziraphale and Crowley, especially since this is not all She is, for she is also Creator and Mother and Love Incarnate.

But today, standing side-by-side over the wreckage of a church in Manchester, which had been set on fire yesterday during the morning sermon, Crowley can’t help but ask. “God is a killer and She made them in Her image, did She not? Therefore, is a man who kills necessarily evil?” He looks over the wreckage, thinking of the newspaper he’d read earlier that morning. 31 dead because of a young man with a grudge. Most of them children and elderly. Modern morality would tell him that this is abominable, that this action is a one-way ticket to Hell, but is it really?

He remembers the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition and World War II. He remembers the witch-burnings. He remembers Sodom and Gomorra, the Ten Plagues of Egypt, the Flood. He remembers, with aching, perfect clarity, the Fall. At what point does one draw the line? What makes the actions of one man abominable, when the actions of hardened killers before him are celebrated?

Crowley is holding Aziraphale’s hand when he asks his angel this, and it is an otherwise perfect morning. Crowley has his angel’s hand in his hand and Aziraphale is not wiggling uncomfortably as he would have 300 years ago. Aziraphale is still rosy-cheeked and warm from their morning breakfast, clad in his 180-year-old suit. Behind him his wings stretch out through Eternity and gleam like sunlight on snow.

Aziraphale has not seen another angel’s wings in just over 5,000 years, and so does not know that they are far too big, far too bright, and far too _white_. Crowley does not enlighten him. Humans think white is the sign of purity, the absence of sin. Crowley has nurtured this belief carefully, quietly. He knows the truth of it, and he guards that truth judiciously.

Crowley smiles and snaps his fingers, grabbing a thermos of steaming hot tea exactly the strength his angel likes best, and hands it over. Aziraphale takes it and smiles, clear blue eyes fever-bright and burning like frost in the air. The air around him smells like tea and the newest cologne Crowley wears. It’s something expensive in a silver bottle that smells clean and spicy. Aziraphale smiles when he inhales the combination.

“Depends on what you think is good and what you think is evil,” the angel says finally. He takes a drink of his tea. His throat bobs. The tea burns his tongue, blisters on the way down. He doesn’t notice.

At this, Crowley’s lips twist into a smile.

Personal opinions, subjective and whimsical. His _favorites_.

***

Hell tries to bring about Armageddon only once. A pair of Dukes rise within his apartment paying absolutely no mind that there is an Angel of the Lord sitting at his table. They try to hand Crowley a child in a basket and tell him it is Lucifer’s son, and he laughs in their faces.

He laughs and laughs and laughs.

Aziraphale does not find it quite so funny.

There is a feeling to Divine Fury right before it erupts – a heaviness in the air, a frightening warmth, a static charge racing down one’s spine. His apartment is full of it. Aziraphale’s wings unfold as he stands, his pupils pinpricks of black lost within electric blue. There is cracking sound, a sharp clap of lightning, and the babe is naught but a smear of ash on the ground.

The two Dukes take one look at the angel turning to them, white wings spreading to their full, terrible length, and disappear quicker than one can blink.

That night they fall into their bed, Aziraphale’s suit neatly folded neatly on the chair across the room, Crowley’s jeans and silk shirt in a heap on the floor. Crowley opens his angel up with his tongue and slick fingers, drawing it out just to hear the way Aziraphale whines at him. When Aziraphale finally snaps and flips them, Crowley can’t help but laugh, clutching his angel’s hips with hands that bruise as the angel rides Crowley _hard_, thighs burning, sweat dripping down his back and pooling at the base of his spine.

Aziraphale’s wings ripple into being, his hips twitching and Crowley smiles at him, arching his hips up hard. The angel spends with a gasp, body taut like a bowstring, wings fluttering wildly before curling in close, cocooning them in brilliant, blinding white. Crowley can’t help but follow him, holding Aziraphale’s hips and groaning. Crowley releases his angel’s hips and admires the already-deep bruises, reaches out and runs his fingers through the wings curled around them.

Aziraphale is still straddling Crowley’s hips and Crowley is softening inside of him and Aziraphale is _crying_. “Don’t pull out,” he says. “Stay inside me, please. Don’t – don’t leave me.” He’s begging and his chest hurts and he’s not sure why, but he knows that Crowley will fix it.

Crowley gathers him close, unfurls his own burnt-dark wings, larger even then Aziraphale’s, and holds him. “Shh, angel,” he breathes into Aziraphale’s ear. “I couldn’t leave you if I tried.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Canon!Crowley is my relationship goal. Seriously. I want a demon to walk across consecrated ground for me without expectation of anything. My 100% heterosexual dad watched that scene – you know the one – and looked at me and nodded. “Yeah, that warrants a blow job at least,” was his remark. On one hand, I never, EVER, want to hear my dad say the word blow job ever again in my life, on the other – he gets it.


	4. Ballroom Blitz

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He sits at the front desk by his phone for three weeks, clutching the satchel of prophecy books Crowley saved for him, never moving, watching people move past through his window with unseeing eyes. Finally, he admits to himself that Crowley isn’t going to come back, isn’t going to call.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the 1941 Blitz scene hits all of my emotional buttons in quite a few different ways. The entire cold open is rich for Canon Divergences, ways that we as authors and fans could twist the story for a different outcome, but the Blitz to me really stands out. That look on Aziraphale's face, the soft way Crowley offers a lift home, the way if you freeze the frame at the right moment, it looks like Aziraphale's wings are burning.... It's just... and what happens after???? 
> 
> In this one, I jumped right into the end-frame of the argument that broke out, mostly because, again, I'm bad at fluff and softness. I imagine that Aziraphale had some kind of emotional epiphany along the lines of "sod Heaven, this demon is mine because he loves me and I love him" and invites him into the bookshop. I imagine they drink, reminisce, and after the first bottle is gone, Aziraphale remembers this darling vintage he's kept in reserve for a special occasion and decides to go get it, because he's going to do it tonight, he's going to lay himself bare to his demon and let Crowley love him they way the demon has been silently shouting at him since Eden, for God's sake, and he's done denying himself. 
> 
> Only Crowley asks for the Holy Water again, and the Argument starts again, and I enter you in on the tale end of that.

“_Satan_ _damn_ _you_, Aziraphale! Why can’t you – just once in your entire _pathetic_ existence – just trust me?” Crowley shouts at him.

Aziraphale stands in the entryway to his back room, fresh wine bottle in one hand, the other clutching his chest, silent and trembling, too scared to move, too scared to open his mouth and say another word. He knows if he says anything, anything at all, it’ll all come tumbling out. Every little bit of it, all the confusing twists and turns his traitorous heart has taken over the many years, all the truths he’s locked away, all the little lies he’s told Crowley to keep himself safe and to keep _his_ demon safer.

He’s run from the truth since Eden, and now all his mistakes and fears and little lies are coming home to roost.

“Please, angel,” Crowley says, staring at him with those lovely serpentine eyes of his. The demon is attempting to be gentler, trying desperately to control his own wild temper, likely in response to Aziraphale’s trembling, wild-eyed state, but it’s a crap shot and even he knows it. “Please. I swear it’s not a suicide pill; it will never be used like that. But I might need it in the future. _Please_.”

Aziraphale couldn’t stop trembling if the Lord Almighty herself commanded it. His heart hurts, his head doubly so. His eyes prickle, and he knows he’s close to crying. How can he make Crowley understand? It’s not about his fear that Crowley will use it on himself – though he is afraid of that, he does believe Crowley when he says he has no intentions of using it on himself – but that’s not the point. It’s never been the point.

If Heaven were to find out…. Aziraphale is not particularly brave, not in the same way Crowley is. He frets and dithers and overthinks and often lets things pass him by because he can’t bring himself to put himself out there. But that’s not to say he doesn’t take risks. This entire thing he has with Crowley has been a constant risk of the highest order. He doesn’t kid himself. If Gabriel or any of the others found out about his association with Crowley, he wouldn’t be recalled. He wouldn’t be made to Fall, or asked to take the leap on his own.

He will be extinguished.

And that on it’s own isn’t quite as frightening as what would come after. He’s not blind, and not stupid. He’s a being of Love, and he knows Love when it’s directed at him. He knows how Crowley feels. Has known since that first besotted look flashed across his dear face the second he realized that Aziraphale was telling the truth about giving away his sword to a pair of exiled humans. He knows that Crowley _lives for him_. He’s the demon’s guiding light, the reason he has to go behind Hell’s back and do what he wants on his terms, the reason he gets out of bed when Humanity takes a turn for the depressing worse.

If Aziraphale is wiped out of existence, what would be left for Crowley?

It doesn’t bear thinking about.

And even that’s not the whole of it. The problem with Holy Water is that, much like most of the Divine, it’s fickle in nature. Holy Water has a mind and will of its own, always will, and the Holier it gets, the worse it gets. Crowley can be as careful as he wants, but if the Holy Water decided he needed to be smote, nothing outside of God’s direct will and divine intervention would save him. Or worse yet, he could splash it on a demon and _nothing_ _would_ _happen_, leaving Crowley in even more danger than he would have already been in – and likely thinking Aziraphale had betrayed him on top of it.

Crowley thinks Holy Water is a direct parallel to Hellfire, and there is nothing Aziraphale can say to make him think otherwise.

“I – I’m sorry,” he finally says. “I’m sorry, Crowley. But I _can’t_.” I can’t put in that requisition form and bring attention to what I’ve been doing with you, he doesn’t say. I can’t risk that the Holy Water will find you as unworthy as she did, he can’t say. I love you too much to take this risk with your life, he will _never_ say.

Crowley throws his glass of wine at the wall with an almighty shout of pure frustration.

Aziraphale flinches.

Crowley just stares at him for a long, uncomfortable moment. He opens his mouth, closes it. Opens it again and _hisses_ at him, sneer curling his lips. He finally throws up his hands and shoulders past Aziraphale, not even pausing as he knocks the angel aside.

Aziraphale stumbles, catches himself against the door frame, and just leans there, listening. He hears the sharp clack of Crowley’s boots stomping across his hardwood floors. The jingle of the shop bell, the rousing slam of his doors. He hears the Bentley roar to life and the squeal of tires as it shoots off down empty streets.

Crowley didn’t say goodbye.

Aziraphale closes his eyes and lets the tears fall.

***

He sits at the front desk by his phone for three weeks, clutching the satchel of prophecy books Crowley saved for him, never moving, watching people move past through his window with unseeing eyes. Finally, he admits to himself that Crowley isn’t going to come back, isn’t going to call. Why would he? He’s apparently been off on his own living well since their last argument in 1862 if that suit and car were any indication. The rescue at the church was probably a last-ditch effort to get the Holy Water from him, a sort of tit-for-tat.

He can still hear Crowley’s voice from That Day in 1862 – _I don’t need you, angel_ – and wonders bitterly why he expected any different.

It always ends this way, as far back as Aziraphale can recall. He does his best, always, to be what others need of him, often at great personal cost, and in the end they all leave. They push too far, ask for that one thing too much, and when he refuses to cross that personal line in the sand, they all leave. The ones that don’t… Gabriel’s smarmy smile crosses his vision, and he grimaces to himself. Best not think of that right now.

He finally gets up, feeling every inch of his corporation’s advanced age, and wonders what the point of it all is. Why bother to keep trying, again and again, when he knows how it’s going to end? Why keep hoping, why keep doing this to himself? He’s a shite angel, and a shite friend, and it seems the only one who hasn’t gotten the memo is the Almighty, who has yet to cast him down to burn with all the rest of them.

Maybe he’s just not worth the effort. Maybe they’ve already tried, and Hell simply refused to take him. It’s not like he’d be worth anything to any of them – he can’t fight, can’t speak clearly or well when it’s important, and has never once in his life been able to follow orders as given.

Aziraphale shuffles around his desk slowly, clutching the satchel like a lifeline. Something deep and terrible is rising within him, some kind of emotion so great and overwhelming that he has no name for it. It burns, he _burns_ with the force of it, throat tightening and eyes prickling again.

With a distant-sounding roar, he throws the satchel through his window. In the same instant, all his angelic grace burns through him, vaporizing everything in his immediate proximity, blasting the rest as far from him as possible. Afterwards, he stands panting in the wreckage of his shop, and feels nothing. He looks at the devastation he’s wrought, and the centuries worth of history, memories, and priceless artifacts that he has destroyed, and feels nothing.

No grief, no rage. Nothing.

He can miracle it all back. He knows every book, every knickknack better than he knows his own face. He can recall in perfect detail every stain, every tear, every imperfection. He could snap his fingers and everything would be exactly as it was, down to the last microcosm of dust floating through the air – but what would be the point?

Achingly numb, he walks out of the wreckage of his shop and starts down the street. He has no destination in mind, no end goal.

He just needs to not be here anymore.

***

Unlike most beings in the world, Crowley has the rather interesting gift of being in exactly the right place at absolutely the wrong time.

It had taken him just over two weeks to calm down, to swallow past his hurt and his anger and to actually think about That Night and see the truth of things: Aziraphale hadn’t denied him the Holy Water again simply because he wanted to deny Crowley, or because he didn’t trust him.

No. Something had Aziraphale trembling in absolute terror of his request, and it wasn’t solely what the Heavenly Host would do to him if they found out about it. Crowley, for the life of him, had never once seen Aziraphale like that, barely even able to speak he was so scared. Even in 1862, when the original argument broke out, Aziraphale had ben desperate and angry, not _scared_.

They had been on the verge of Something, and he’d gone out and mucked it up. Aziraphale had been starry eyed and almost bold That Night, seemingly coming to some kind of conclusion regarding Them and about to Do Something – he’d been holding a bottle of wine Crowley knew that Aziraphale had been keeping in reserve for a Very Special Occasion – when Crowley just _had_ to open his mouth and ask _again_ instead of leaving well enough alone.

It had taken another week and a half to get himself together enough to go see the angel.

He arrives to the blown out remains of a bookshop, the heavy scent of grief and despair, and no sign of Aziraphale.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I can picture this continuing in so many ways, which is why I left it off like that.
> 
> I can see it as a sort of "find waldo/carmen san diego" bout of adventures for Crowley and Aziraphale. Aziraphale finding himself along the way, learning how to live and not be so _terrified_ of everything and anything, embracing that inner bastard of him, and Crowley chasing behind him, always a few steps behind because he's often forced to deal with the fallouts of Aziraphale's little adventures, often by putting the fear of Crowley into whatever low-level angel and/or demon managed to catch wind that Heaven's remaining Principality is going a little wonky.
> 
> I can also see it as the precursor to a Fallen!Angel Aziraphale fic, where in his depression, Aziraphale just gives up entirely and throws himself out of Heaven - or has it forced on him because in his depressed state he doesn't care about the consequences and just starts flinging truths Heaven would likely not want to hear. And of course, Crowley isn't there in time to stop anything, arrives to a giant, burning crater in the ground and the lingering scent of a very familiar Grace. 
> 
> Of course, I could also see this as one of those few, rare fics I've found over the course of my sojourn through this fandom, where Heaven is actually not that bad, that everything we see is basically just one large misunderstanding after another not helped by the massive amounts of miscommunication between American!coded Gabriel and British!coded Aziraphale. Perhaps there's a reason Aziraphale is the only Principality - the only angel, even - left on Earth. Maybe there are mental repercussions to inhabiting a human form and living among Humanity in all it's depravity that Heaven hadn't foreseen until the other Principalities had already succumbed and either took the plunge out of heaven or offed themselves in despair. (There's one that no one mentions, the went a little mad and flew into a black hole. Not even the seraphs know what happened to that one, what the effect of flinging one's celestial being into a black hole would do. No one knows if that one is dead or still alive, being constantly ripped apart by the gravitational pull. It doesn't bear thinking about.) Heaven gathers around their depressed breathren, straightens their collective shit out, and goes and helps their longest surviving Earthly representative and Hell's traitorous demon who can actually, genuinely even!, Love get their respective shit figured out.


	5. Thus Sayeth The Lord

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Archangels find that they are not exactly at the top of the food-chain. :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dunno. I just wanted some aftermath tbh.
> 
> I made up a ton of angel names off the top of my head. Please forgive me for any and all inaccuracies, it's been 20-some years since I made a legitimate study of angels.
> 
> Also please forgive my blatant American use of feet/inches in place of meters. I sucked at math and conversion has never been my thing. If anyone wants to help an ignorant American out, bless you.
> 
> I'm pretty neutral about the Crowley-was-Raphael debate. I personally typically don't write him that way for the most part, but I can see it. In this he is Raphael simply because of the connection with Aziraphale's name, but otherwise I have no personal attachment to that fan-theory.

The scene would be funny in any other situation. A lone, 4'9" female-shaped entity standing before four beings - the smallest of which was 5'10" - hands on her hips and a cold sneer twisting her otherwise pretty features. Contrary to sizing, the other four appear to be doing their absolute best to shrink into obscurity, appearing to any who cared to look to be afraid of the diminuitive being before them.

This would only make sense to other angels. After all, the female-shaped entity was a Seraphim, second only to God Herself, and they were Archangels. Technically, Michael was considered a seraph, as was Gabriel, but even within the same class, there were still rankings. It came down to design and function, and the Seraph named Ondariel was leagues beyond any of them. She had to be, as after the fall, there hadn't been enough Archangels to cover the many choirs. Ondariel had picked up the majority of the slack, taking over the leadership of the entire 1st and 3rd circle of choirs, leaving the rest of them to their respective duties. Ondariel didn't typically contact any of them, being far too busy making sure the angels under her care were well-cared for and functioning optimally at their own duties, but here they all were, summoned like naughty children before a principal.

Even worse was the entire Host arrayed behind her back. This was not only to be a dressing down - it was to be a highly public dressing-down.

“Tell me, is it not in the Laws that all disciplinary actions towards a member of a choir must be discussed at length with the leader of that choir?”

“It is,” Michael confirms, wings drooping.

“Tell me, is it not in the Laws that all other options _must_ be explored before ANY Angel of the Lord is to be Felled unless by Her own decree and design?”

“It is,” this from Uriel, shifting anxiously.

“Tell me, is it not in the Laws that if in the event that no other option could be taken and an Angel of the Lord is to be Felled, that it is the duty of that angel’s Commanding Officer to be the one to oversee the trial?”

“It is,” said Gabriel, _finally _understanding that something was about to go very, very wrong.

“Then explain to me, oh Messenger of the Lord, how it is that you can stand before me and tell me that Aziraphale has not only been barred from Heaven, but that all of the Archangels have conspired behind my back to attempt to _execute_ our only remaining Earth-side Principality?”

Gabriel stuttered for a long moment. “He was consorting with a demon!” he finally said. “He disobeyed orders, helped prevent the Apocalypse, and – ”

“Obeyed the orders as received to him from the Lord Almighty _Herself_,” came the icy reply.

“What.”

Ondariel smiled, and while it was just as pretty and demure as the rest of her, there was something almost bloodthirsty about it. “As per Her directives shortly after the Sealing of Eden, Aziraphale was to watch over the human race, and when the End of Days approached, was to be their judge and jury.” Her head tilted up and triumph glinted in her eyes. “By his word alone would the Sentencing of Man be started – and he _chose_ their continued existence. That he was not Felled by Her shows that he has not failed in his duties.”

Gabriel grit his teeth. “And the demon?”

Ondariel laughed meanly. “I’m surprised you did not recognize your brother, Gabriel. Raphael always did look amazing with red hair.”

Chaos. Utter chaos. The entire Host descended into pandemonium at those carefully chosen words.

See, the thing is, the rhetoric line from the higher choirs is that there never was a Raphael. Raphael was a story at best, a human creation that the guardian angels brought back in whispers and drabs. This was mostly because none of the Archangels wanted to admit that one of their own had Fallen. Gabriel in particular had been the most vocal in his protestation of Raphael’s existence.

The other issue was a minor one in comparison, but it had always lurked behind the thoughts of any angel who asked – If there was no Archangel Raphael, then why was Aziraphale named ‘of Raphael’? The only other angels named as such were designed by God Herself as a pair, a unit not to be tampered with.

“Raphael does not – ”

“Spare me the tired rhetoric,” Ondariel snapped. “You forget yourself, Messenger. I was there when you all were created, I know each of your names and who amongst you is now below. Raphael, Samael, Azrael, Bastiel, Auriel… you Archangels are not infallible. In fact, it could be argued that it is entirely due to your kind’s leadership amongst the choirs that the Great War took place to begin with. And barring that entirely too-long debate, I can safely say that the disarray of Heaven as it stands today is entirely _your fault.”_

Ondariel raised her chin and somehow managed to stare down her nose at them despite being at least a foot shorter. “I have bypassed your Metatron and contacted the Almighty directly regarding the matter.”

At this, silence overtook the entire room.

“You can _do_ that?” Sandalphon asked, sounding almost delighted.

Ondariel spared himm a brief look. “In defense of my own, I can and will,” she confirmed. Her gaze sharpened as it returned to Gabriel. “Aziraphale was one of mine, Archangel Gabriel. He may have been _loaned_ to you, and may have submitted reports for your review, but at the end of the day he was still _mine_. My orders, should I have chosen to give them, would have superseded yours in all ways. And Her orders supersede all of ours.

“I quote Her verbatim: “Aziraphale is exactly as I designed him to be and did exactly what I needed him to do in exactly the way I needed him to do it. He committed no crimes, nor did he fail at any of his assigned duties. Any and all thoughts of punishment or recrimination are to be dropped immediately. He and the entity known as Crowley, formerly known as the Archangel Raphael, are to be left alone on Earth. They are not to be bothered, not to be watched, not to be interfered with on any personal or business-related level. Any angel who defies this decree will be held fully accountable for any damages that result tenfold.”

Ondariel bared her teeth. “_Thus sayeth the Lord_.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first thing I wrote for this fandom. I'll be adding more as I go. There may be a few crossovers here and there, but for the most part, it's just goign to be the boys.


End file.
